I have an appointment to check out a massage therapy school tomorrow morning.

The first time I decided to go to massage therapy school was over ten years ago. I got pregnant instead, and for some reason decided to move to California. I had a miscarriage, but we left Colorado anyway. That is something I regret.

I moved back to Colorado eventually, without the asshat boyfriend, and while I was there I finally got back into college. I was doing really well, so, naturally I had to fuck it up. How could I accomplish that? Move away! So that’s what I did. I moved to Washington.

My plan was to work for a year to get residency, then finish college. Instead, I met a guy, got engaged, moved in with him and got pregnant. No wedding though. We’re just perma-engaged I guess, though we refer to each other as husband and wife, and we have a child. So, school got side-tracked for a while, but I did go back a couple of years ago. 

I’m working my way through, in fits and starts, and am now, after 12 years, one math class away from getting my AA. Woot! But I’ve lost focus. I don’t know what I want to major in, and all of the majors that even interest me are expensive tickets to being an over-educated barista, or an underpaid social-services worker. There’s something about school that makes me feel unhealthy. It’s all that living in my head I think; it furthers my disconnection from my body.

So I’ve been thinking about massage therapy school again. I like the idea of working in a physical capacity like that. Of having a job that entails making people feel good. I’m also interested in some types of therapy that combine body-work with talk therapy - somatic psychotherapy is one, Hakomi is another. When I massage C, I think of how healing massage therapy could be for children; when I get massages for myself, I think how healing it would be for more fat people to get massage. I see so many ways to reach out, so many ways that I could possibly succeed. Scary.

I have been cultivating my inner voice. It yells at me now, to get me out of bed and off to the gym. It’s trying to talk to me about food even. And, lately, it is telling me to do this massage therapy school thing, and to do it now. I am trying to trust that, and not just dismiss it as another of my whims. Then I think, maybe my whims are ok. I’ve made a lot of major life decisions on a whim, and usually they’ve worked out just fine. Part of me says it doesn’t matter what I do, I just need to do something. Something to fill up the time, keep me occupied.

My plan was to go back to college and finish that damn math requirement this winter. But I let the time for registration come and go without a thought. I’m not ready, or I just don’t want to go back there now. But I’m feeling a little excited about the massage therapy school. A little scared too. How can I pick something, end this directionless limbo I’ve been drifting about for so long? Who am I to be making those kind of life decisions?

Maybe I should stop thinking about it so much. This is what I will do. I will stop thinking about the decision until after I go see the school. I will probably know what I want to do after I see the school anyway. I am making a commitment to attend my appointment tomorrow, even if it is early in the morning and I’m getting a cold.

Wish me luck.

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